Executive Summary: This report addresses recent criticism of policies by public school officials to fashion campus safety plans around inter-agency partnerships, not the least of which involve the use of law enforcement personnel known as school resource officers (SRO). This aspect of education law, now commonly known as “school safety law,” has been the subject of considerable and thoughtful development over the last thirty years. However, recent criticism has called into question the fairness and effectiveness of this type of inter-agency collaboration in the school context. By focusing on child welfare reform, student rights, victim’s rights, and liability, the report corrects incorrect impressions about the purpose and use of school resource officers as an integral part of school safety teams, primarily by documenting the success of public educators maintaining a safe campus climate using the team approach.

Description: a study from Georgetown Law’s Center on Poverty and Inequality

Executive Summary: School-based police officers, known as school resource officers (SROs), have become a common and growing presence in schools across the nation. The presence of law enforcement in school, while intended to increase school safety, has also been associated with increased surveillance and criminalization of students — especially students of color. Little data exists, however, on the experiences of girls of color. To fill this gap, the Georgetown Law Center on Poverty and Inequality and the National Black Women’s Justice Institute engaged in research to examine the relationship between girls of color and SROs.

Description: Guidance from the National Association of School Psychologists and the National Association of School Resource Officers

Executive Summary: The National Association of School Psychologists and the National Association of School Resource Officers have partnered to provide this guidance on armed assailant training, with input from Safe and Sound: A Sandy Hook Initiative and the ALiCE Training Institute. This document provides guidance on the important factors schools must take into account when considering and conducting armed assailant drills, with points on (1) Drill Approaches and Planning, (2) Developmental and Mental Health Considerations, and (3) Steps for Conducting Safe, Effective, and Appropriate Drills.

Description: a study from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office)

Executive Summary: Over the past decade, advances in the technologies used by law enforcement agencies have been accelerating at an extremely rapid pace. Many police executives are making decisions about whether to acquire technologies that did not exist when they began their careers—technologies like automated license plate readers, gunshot detection systems, facial recognition software, predictive analytics systems, communications systems that bring data to officers’ laptops or handheld devices, GPS applications, and social media to investigate crimes and communicate with the public. Even as police departments are increasingly adopting body-worn cameras, many questions about this technology have yet to be answered. In an effort to address these questions and produce policy guidance to law enforcement agencies, the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), with support from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office), conducted research in 2013 on the use of body-worn cameras . This research project consisted of three major components: an informal survey of 500 law enforcement agencies nationwide; interviews with police executives; and a conference in which police chiefs and other experts from across the country gathered to discuss the use of body-worn cameras.